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Morgane Richardson, a 2008 graduate of Middlebury College, is speaking out about what it’s like to go to a largely white, elite college as a person of color. Ileana Jimenez, aka Feminist Teacher, interviewed her on her blog recently. An excerpt:

I could write a whole book on what I would have said had a microphone been provided! You know, as a student, I wasn’t thinking about policy changes on a big level. I was thinking about the day-to-day, “How do I survive here?,” “How do my fellow women of color survive here?,” “What can we do to make this a little more comfortable for us?” Ultimately, I wanted the college to hear our individual struggles. They made such a big deal about diversifying the school, but there was no integration, no real questioning of how we were doing day-to-day. As for when I wanted them to hear us, the answer is always. I always wanted them to hear us. There should always be a place for students of color to speak out and be heard, not just amongst each other.

I was heartened to read this interview for so many reasons. As a graduate of Barnard College, I often felt like the dynamics of race and class were only discussed among segregated groups, or pseudo-intellectual, depersonalized ways, rather than being taken on directly and with a sense of intersectional responsibility. Barnard is the all women’s college under the Columbia University umbrella–a very problematic relationship.

I came to Barnard thinking that I was incredibly lucky to have gotten in at all, and quickly learned that I would be typecast as both a second-class citizen (Barnard girls, purportedly, only went to Barnard because they weren’t smart enough to get into Columbia) and a slut (“Barnard girls to bed, Columbia girls to wed” was actually uttered with a semi-serious straight-face by many a Columbia man). I have often thought about speaking out about these heinous dynamics so that another first-year doesn’t have to spend precious college time and energy processing it the way I did, but been too distracted to get my shit together.

Richardson is essentially doing the incredibly unselfish and generous thing–making sure others don’t have to feel alone in the same way she did, giving them a resource to depend on in their time of similar need. She is putting together an anthology of writings and visual arts, titled Refuse the Silence, on the topic. Learn more and submit here.

Lambda Literary Award-winning writer Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha’s Bodymap, published this summer by Mawenzi House, returns often to the word “home.” Home is a meeting of body and map,
tattooed on Piepzna-Samarasinha’s breastplate and charted throughout the work in sensory memories, corporeal trauma, physical pleasures. “You’re going to find the people you can sketch the secret inside the world with. If you can’t find them you can sketch the secret inside of your world inside yourself,” she writes. She sometimes sketches ‘the secret inside of world’ with lovers, and we’re lucky enough to get to listen to the lyric she finds: “Just dissolve into the deliciousness of lying down with someone else who knew what it was like to always lie down.”

The co-founder ...

Lambda Literary Award-winning writer Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha’s Bodymap, published this summer by Mawenzi House, returns often to the word “home.” Home is a meeting of body and map,
tattooed on Piepzna-Samarasinha’s breastplate and charted throughout the work in ...

Today in depressing facts we need to do something about: This new report on the “sexual abuse to prison pipeline,” which cites sexual abuse as one of the greatest predictors of girls’ entrance into the juvenile justice system.

Not only does the report alert us to a serious problem in sore need of research and reform — it challenges us to think more rigorously, more systemically, and more kindly about cycles of trauma and abuse.

Put out by the Human Rights Project for Girls, the Ms. Foundation, and Georgetown’s Center on Poverty and Inequality, the report finds that girls are entering the juvenile justice system more than ever — and not because they are becoming more violent. Rather, increasing enforcement ...

Today in depressing facts we need to do something about: This new report on the “sexual abuse to prison pipeline,” which cites sexual abuse as one of the greatest predictors of girls’ entrance into the juvenile ...

It seems as if everyone is talking about Serena Williams, whether it’s her dominance or the way she perseveres in the face of obvious sexism and racism. Regardless, for the second time in her career, she has achieved the “Serena Slam,” which is holding all four major titles simultaneously. Now, the tennis world is alive with the possibility of another tennis player winning all four major titles in the same calendar year. Despite the pressure, Williams’ personality still shines through even in her post-match interview at Wimbledon.

Going beyond the typical “it hasn’t sunk in yet” and praising her opponent, Williams’ ability to still be the goofy kid who splashed onto the tennis scene as a teenager is ...

It seems as if everyone is talking about Serena Williams, whether it’s her dominance or the way she perseveres in the face of obvious sexism and racism. Regardless, for the second time in her career, ...